Wednesday, February 04, 2015

Summer 2015 is fast approaching and many of us are already saving money for our summer getaway and family outing. We’re very lucky that we live in a tropical island rich of white sand beaches and remote virgin islands. There are lots of travel option if you want to go to the beach and enjoy the sun, you can travel via land, sea or air. But some people don’t like to travel for many hours, others are scared to leave the Luzon island. I’m glad that we still have good beaches along the coast of Nasugbu, Batangas. It’s the nearest beach in Manila where you can reach for a total of 2.5 hours by car.
If you are looking for a nice beach that you can relax, have a quiet moment, enjoy nature and be private at the same time, then I introduce to you Club Punta Fuego.

Club Punta Fuego owns two kinds of beach location – the main club of Club Punta Fuego where you can book a stay for many days and the Terrazas de Punta Fuego that is open for day tours only.

Me and my wife went here to have an overnight staycation and beach vacation, its our first time to be here in Club Punta Fuego and the club is not new to us, we hear reviews and experiences from our friends and family who went here and they say it’s an exclusive club that only members and their referrals are allowed to enter.

Normally, only members who bought the membership with a price of 1 Million pesos + annual dues are allowed to enter and to use the facilities of the club. They can also get a request approval for their family and friends to use the benefits of the Club Punta Fuego member. Turning the member into your own sponsor for the vacation expenses.

Its hard to get an access as they say, but after our visit, we learned that Club Punta Fuego opened a slot for those who wants to enjoy the amenities of their club – the beach, the rooms, the pools, and water sports activity.

I got in touch with the club general manager, Mr. Mikel Arriet Arruiz, and he said that people can book their stay via their official website, Agoda, and other online booking channels. It’s a booking by chance, because there are times that they are fully booked and you have to book early in order to reserve the room in advance. Walk ins are not allowed.

CLUB PUNTA FUEGO

Club Punta Fuego is a premiere membership resort club located on Peninsula de Punta Fuego on the pristine coast of Nasugbu, Batangas. It is a first class recreation facility offering services and amenities comparable only to the best resorts and hotels in the world.

This tranquil and secluded resort is only 2.5 hours away from Manila via two major routes: (1) the new Ternate-Nasugbu Highway in Cavite or (2) South Luzon Expressway via Tagaytay. Being this easily accessible makes the Club ideal for quick holiday weekend trips, business outings, or family getaways.

Inspired by Fisher Island in Miami, Florida, development of the property began in 1995 as Roxaco Land Corporation and Landco Pacific Corporation partnered to create a Spanish-Mediterranean style residential resort that masterfully combines natural beauty and modern luxury. Club Punta Fuego soon opened its doors as a fully operational private enclave under the management of Fuego Hotels and Properties.

Rates:
Members – PHP 6299
Non members – PHP8000-9000+

HOW TO GO THERE???
TRAVEL VIA KAYBIANG TUNNEL

The fastest route for us going to Nasugbu, Batangas is via the Ternate-Nasugbu highway, it’s a new road that connects Cavite and Batangas via the new constructed Kaybiang Tunnel. We are lucky that we live in Cavite and going to Nasugbu is so fast, we reached Club Punta Fuego in just 2 hours.

Compare it if we took the route of Tagaytay, it might be around 4 hours if we will come from Alabang or Tagaytay. It’s a long cut if you will come from SLEX. So for travelers, I suggest take the CAVITEX road and head to Tanza-Maragondon-Ternate-Kaybiang route.

We used my Apple map as our GPS, we’re glad that we didn’t get lost, thumbs up for the plenty of road signs.

Its faster to travel if you have your own car service, for commuters, the best travel route is to ride the Tagaytay-Nasugbu bus, then hire a tricycle or jeep to take you to Brgy. Balaytigue, Nasugbu, Batangas

Kaybiang Tunnel
A tunnel through the mountain that connects two city – Cavite and Batangas.
It looks like a long tunnel, but we went through for less than 20 seconds in slow speed.

We got excited when we saw this awesome mountain ranges at the other side of the tunnel, then we saw the coastline and the fine sand of the beach, we learned that we are already in Nasugbu, Batangas.

We super enjoyed the view and this prompt us to take lots of photos and selfies hahaha. Our driver, Mang Jetong enjoyed the view too, because its his first time to travel taking the Kaybiang tunnel route to Club Punta Fuego.

I’m happy to see that the mountains are protected and they are growing in numbers…endlessly.
Its like a virgin forest with a highway. I saw other motorist park their car just to have a short picnic while enjoying the greeny scene and cold breeze. Watch out also for crossing wild monkeys on the road

After 2 hours, we arrived in Club Punta Fuego. The guards will check your booking details, they will not allow walk ins and also non members inside the club.

INSIDE CLUB PUNTA FUEGO

THE RECEPTION DESK

We dropped off here at the reception area.

Before we sign our attendance, I filled up first this registration form and then they offered us a cold welcome drink, plus a cold wet towel to freshen up our face. Our reception staff guided us around and also brief us the kinds of amenities we can enjoy here in Club Punta Fuego.

THE VIEW INSIDE CLUB PUNTA FUEGO

There’s a breath taking view after going down a few steps from the reception area, here I saw their infinity pool and the view of the bay. Club Punta Fuego set up is Spanish-Mediterranean style residential resort, here you can enjoy natural beauty and modern luxury.

You can enjoy two kinds of pool in the main club of Club Punta Fuego 1) infinity pool 2) children’s pool.
If you want to enjoy the beach, just go to the Long Beach drive for the white sand beach and there’s another infinity pool there waiting for you.

THE CASITA ROOMS

Club Punta Fuego rooms are called “casitas”, they have 33 casitas in the main club, with a spacious room, veranda with view of the West Philippine sea, and located around the greeny garden with lots of trees. The casitas are perfect for your private moment with nature.

Each casita doors are equipped with automatic lock door, you can open it with a swipe of your key card.

My wife fell in love with the veranda setting. I told her if it gives a romantic vibe. She didn’t answered but I can tell she agrees after I saw her smile. The veranda can be closed with a glass door or the screen door. We left the screen door open through out the day while we enjoy watching the sea view.

In every resort or hotel room, I call this desk area as my office. But Its weird that I didn’t have the time to use it. We brought our laptop, but I rarely use it to check my email or blog. I armed myself with an iPhone and I’m good to be connected with the outside world. Thanks to Club Punta Fuego for the fast and reliable wifi internet connection.

Infront of the bed and the door of the veranda is this mini dining table.
Ohhhh its one of the awesome romantic set up that we saw for the start of 2015 hahahah. Thanks Club Punta Fuego for the set up.

Me and my wife skipped on drinking the wine, but we sure love the fruits and muffin.

Thank you for the set up and note!!

There’s a mini bar, water heater for your coffee and also a small refrigerator.

THE BATHROOM

Here’s inside the bathroom of their casitas.. It looks old and over used, but its clean and everything is working fine.

The toiletrees, thank goodness they have a hair dryer, bathroom with rain shower head, cold and hot temp, toilet with bidet (thank you for that bidet), and an outdoor area where you can dry your clothes. Don’t worry, the walls are high and its still secured.

I super love our room. I joked on our receptionist that they have two separate bed for couples hahaha. The bed can still fit two people and this room is good for 4 people only, for a price of one booking. (PHP 8,000+)

THINGS YOU CAN DO INSIDE CLUB PUNTA FUEGO

You are ready to swim, dive and sun bathe, there are lots of things you can do here in Club Punta Fuego, if you have your own golf gear, try inquire about the rates and schedule of their golf course, if you’re a yacht enthusiast just ask them for the rate to rent one boat, if you want to snorkel or dive then inquire about the rates of their island hop adventure.

Since I don’t do those things, I spotted some interesting activity that you can do while in Club Punta Fuego.

There’s a mini-theater inside Club Punta Fuego, it’s a small cinema and every day they have a film showing of some foreign movies, check the screening sched and title at the reception area.

Rejuvenate and relax after your beach adventure here in Ylang Ylang Spa. rates are around PHP 750 to up. The spa looks like your own hotel room. Their bathroom is complete with toiletries just for you.

You can take a shower and groom yourself in the bathroom of the spa after the massage.

I went here an hour before we leave the club. I need a power massage to wake up my muscles after a heavy beating in skim boarding.

Children’s pool in Club Punta Fuego

Go snorkel or play with the ocean here in Terrazas de Punta Fuego

Enjoy the pool at Terrazas de Punta Fuego. I love swimming here, because the tree around the pool serves as our sun shade throughout the day. No worries for sun burns.

There are three restaurants here in Club Punta Fuego
1. San Diego Café
2. Member’s Lounge
3. IL Jardineto (in Long Beach)

in Terrazas, they have 1 restaurant by the pool
1. Sol Café
2. but sometimes they open a small bar at the cottage area by the beach front.

AVAILABLE TRANSPORTATION

There’s a shuttle for the in house guest. You can take the shuttle going to Long Beach drive, the shuttle drives there and back to the main club every 30 minutes. All rides are FREE.

Our receptionist guided us to our casita room. We rode the mini golf cart to transport us down the hill where our casita is located.

There’s no free transport going to Terrazas de Punta Fuego, its located outside the club, it’s a 15 min drive and you can go there by using your own car. When you arrived there, just mention your casita room and name for registration.

FRIENDLY STAFF AND GENERAL MANAGER

We met the people and staff here in Club Punta Fuego, they are very accommodating and friendly to all their guest pinoys or foreigners. We met the general manager, Mr. Mikel, he’s a Spanish foreigner living here in our country for 10 years, he started as a chef in Club Punta Fuego and then he got promoted as GM of the entire club.

We also met Albert, one of the staff of San Diego Café, we learned that his brother lives in the same village that we lived in here in Cavite. He said that he will visit us when he got a day off. Thanks also for the complimentary Humus and bread.

Also in Terrazas, we met Froilan who assisted us for our lunch and tour around the beach, also thanks to the two female receptionist who helped us in the booking and also for the guest activity around the club.

RESTAURANT AND POOL OF CLUB PUNTA FUEGO

There are three kinds of activity that you can do whenever you are in a beach vacation
1. Sleep
2. Swim
3. Eat

Infinity pool at the main club.
They have two big infinity pool that are facing the West Philippine Sea, here I enjoyed a short dip while watching the sunset.

I’m swimming alone because my wife is at the spa.
The pool is warm and the color matches with the color of the sea.

The infinity pool levels to the view of the sea and the horizon.
Sunset viewing is good here.

See you tomorrow Mr. Sun

My wife just arrived, and she took a photo of me floating in the infinity pool.
Its just my way of relaxing my body while staring at the golden sky during the sunset.

You see what I mean?
The infinity pool levels to the view of the West Philippine Sea..

Astig!!!!!

At the main club, there are two restaurants available, you can go here on foot from your casitas or the pool. The San Diego Café and Members Lounge are open for lunch and dinner. San Diego café is also the main restaurant for our breakfast.

Here’s the famous and must try Black Ebi Tempura.
Its an original recipe and concept of GM Mikel when he was a chef before. Sobra sarap and I super love the taste of the juicy prawn and the aroma taste of the squid’s ink.

CLUB PUNTA FUEGO AT NIGHT

There’s nothing much to do at night here in Club Punta Fuego, we’re not hard drinkers so we just stayed here in our room. I was waiting for clear skies for me to do some astrophotography, but it’s a bit cloudy and the moon is still shiny.

After watching some tele drama series, Its time for me to invade the TV for some docu series at Natgeo.
My wife brought her laptop because she’s a work at home freelancer. She finished some task for 30minutes and then we went to bed.

CLUB PUNTA FUEGO IN THE MORNING

Good morning Club Punta Fuego!
The sky is blue and the sun shines perfectly, this is the view that welcomed our morning. Ganda!!!!

We head over to San Diego café to eat our breakfast, here they serve their breakfast in a buffet manner.

They have lots of food for breakfast, but my heart goes to their home made corned beef.
I super love it!

Ahaahaha. bago gising pa ko dito.

Happy breakfast!!!

San Diego café offered us to try their churros.
ok lang naman.

For lunch, we dined here in Members Lounge, its an air conditioned mini restaurant just below San Diego Café

We don’t want to over eat ourselves, so we ordered their special pork adobo for our lunch
and…

Sweet Chili prawns.

LONG BEACH – CLUB PUNTA FUEGO

In the main club of Club Punta Fuego, the only available beach that can be accessed by in house guest is the Long Beach, located at Long Beach drive. There’s another beach area but it can only be accessed by home owners and club members. The shuttle can take you here any time. They can pick you up from the reception area and travel is around 2 minutes away from the main club.

The beach’s sand is color close to white and flesh color. I was scouting for the best place to start my skim boarding activity, but I learned that the sand here contains some small pebbles and rocks. The GM said that the best place to do skim boarding is at the beach bay of Terrazas de Punta Fuego.

The water is crystal clear, and its swimmable. The tide is low in the morning, but the sea started to rise around 11am. We are scheduled to do jet skiing or wind surfing, but we decided to stay at the beach and do some snorkeling.

I brought my own snorkeling gear and skim board. Here I taught my wife on how to snorkel.

I like the Long Beach here in Club Punta Fuego, its quiet and tame,and there are lots of fish under the water. There are some live corals near the beach, it’s a good spot for snorkeling. There’s an area of the beach that is all pure sand. But its boring to swim there.

Snorkeling away…..
I enjoyed our snorkeling activity, I went to the neck high water and swam my way going to the beach. Its better to do that way and instead of swimming away from the coast line.

Next time, I will bring my own float vest, fins and new snorkel goggles.

There’s no one around here in Long Beach..its our first time to own the place and be alone in Paradise hahahah

Its so quiet and we’re the only guest who are enjoying the sea here in Long Beach.

I tried skim boarding in Long Beach but its a total fail, there are no small waves and the sand is a bit rocky.

Children’s playground and water sports rental here in Long Beach.

IL Jardineto, the only restaurant here in Long Beach, enjoy the food under the sun at their al fresco dining area.

Another infinity pool in Long Beach.
You can swim here if you don’t want the salty water of the sea. The pool is 5-6 feet deep.

The rocky coastline of Long Beach. I’m looking at the other side of the coast and dreaming of kayaking my way to other side.

Next time, I will buy and bring my own inflatable kayak for my water sports activity.

TERRAZAS DE PUNTA FUEGO

You saw the club, now I take you to the other side of Club Punta Fuego. There’s another coastline at the other side of Nasugbu, Batangas, here they own the Terrazas de Punta Fuego. It’s a beach resort available for day tour only.

There’s a separate rate available, just inquire via their website or Facebook page of Club Punta Fuego.

It’s a 15 minute drive away from the main club located outside Club Punta Fuego.

The pool of Terrazas
The most beautiful pool set up at the beach front.

We love the trees and plants around the pool. This is the place that will make you more closer to nature.

We’re excited to swim and eat here hahahah.
As usual..when couples are in beach vacation.

My view from Sol Café here in Terrazas de Punta Fuego.

Sol Café in Terrazas de Punta Fuego

Here’s our lunch at Sol Café!!!! seafood and meat galore!!!

They offered this special food of Sol Café – the Café Sol Bounty (priced at PHP1880)

They also served to us a plate with different kinds of desserts that are offered in their menu.

haha the foodie in me kicks in…and we surrendered after a bite of desserts.
Sol Café offers Filipino food, seafood, pasta and grills.

btw, their Sinigang Pork is the best!! (priced at PHP 350)

Mr. Froilan of Sol Café invited us for a short tour and guide around the Terrazas. Here we saw the cottage set up by the beach front.

Guest from the main club can rent a cottage area for around PHP500 to up. And this beach resort is open only til 6PM. Overnights are not available.

Wife Lace enjoys to stay in a hammock.

I told her that our family can fit in one cottage room. Our next plan is to book our family here this summer.

The beach here is okay, the colors, sight and sound feels like we are in Boracay.

If you are here, the entire coast line is yours!!

The view of the cottage rooms and the beach area

The locker and shower area here in Terrazas.
There’s also a clinic station and security people roaming around the beach.

We wasted no time when we are here in Terrazas, I did my skim boarding at the beach and after some beating with the sea and sand, we took a rest by the pool of Terrazas til our depature. I really like it here and too bad that this place is til 6pm only.

They also sell swim wears here at the mini store of Terrazas, you can buy your bikinis and rash guard here if you forgot to bring your own. Also there’s a mini store too at the main club. For me, there are lots of selections here in Terrazas.

If you are in Terrazas de Punta Fuego, after registering, they will let you wear this sticker wrist band to let them know that you are an in house guest. The entire coastline is open to the public, so many people walks around here selling some fresh catch and some sea shell jewelries.

My view after being totally beat up by the ocean hahhaah.
Skim boarding is so hard….and I learned something new for my water sport.
Add rubber grip to my board and wear knee bands on my right knee to avoid injuries.

My wife invites me to swim with her… I lost my mood because I’m beat up and tired. I told her that we continue the swimming and relaxation at the pool area of Terrazas.

And here’s my micro sleep moment under the pool of Terrazas. It’s a quick 10-15 sleep and I feel re-energized again. I love the glow of the pool under sun. Its like that we’re swimming in open waters.

Our beach staycation experience is awesome here in Club Punta Fuego. My wife told me that its her first time to be with the ocean after 10 years.. wow!!! masyado kasi sya busy dati. I’m really glad that Club Punta Fuego opened its gates for us to try their exclusive club and resort. And I hope you can try and enjoy it too.

I will go back here for another leg of our beach staycation.. Our 5 year old son, Ashton, will join us next.
GOING BACK HOME

Thank you for reading my blog post. For a detailed story and more tips.
Pls go to my Club Punta Fuego blog series here in Azrael’s Merryland.